Fact Checked: IGBO UKWU WERE NRI SLAVE; Origin and History of Igbo Ukwu - Onyeji Nnaji

Copied from the, Accounts of Igbo Origins and History from Beginning to Present by Onyeji Nnaji

T.C. Shaw’s archaeological finds dominated historians’ writings about Igbo Ukwu in the manner that almost none gave attention to issues bothering on the history of Igbo Ukwu. The inhabitants also, overtaken by the conviviality that the finds brought, seized the opportunity to conceal their history. It was though a thing of surprise to historians and archaeologists, witnessing the finds that upturned the hierarchy already bestowed on the Ife and Benin over their Igbo neighbour. It did not only upturn the hierarchy, it forced history to resume a rewriting stage with Igbo at the top. It all begun with the stupefied discovery made by Isaiah Anozie within his compound. He was digging a well when he accidentally stumbled on some bronze ornaments. The ornaments looked strange to him, but little did he know that he was dwelling in a compound with bronze library underneath. Concentrating on the location, he unearthed more utensils that he found valuable. This event took effect in 1938. 

In 1939, the British Commissioner of Oka district, Frank W. Carpenter arrived in Oka. As time glided, he became aware of the finds and approached the Anozie family for the samples of the bronze. In 1948 he proceeded for Nairobi where he worked for the Labour Commission. In 1956, F.W. Carpenter presented objects from a hoard found at the site of Igbo Ukwu to the British Museum in London. Other parts were offered for sale at Sotheby's 2 December 1957, about 140 to 147. They were later withdrawn and sold to the museum in Lagos. It was about this time that T.C. Shaw gained the invitation by the Department of Antiquity to come for the excavation. Shaw’s finds were numerous. He unearthed the burial ornaments of Nri priests. With all these found within Igbo Ukwu, they became presumptuous that they may be the oldest Igbo people that ever lived. They recovered themselves a little the moment Shaw told them that the land that bore the excavation may have belonged to the Oraeri people in the past. Shaw himself reported that,

They (Oreri people) also said that the ground where the excavations were taking place used to lie in Oreri, but that the Igbo-Ukwu people had captured it from them. I collected traditions in Igbo-Ukwu also which confirmed the story. I mentioned this tradition in my interim report on the excavations but was strongly taken to task for doing so at a meeting of the Igbo-Ukwu Local Council in 1964, to discuss a project for a museum, since it was felt that any statement might endanger Igbo-Ukwu’s claim to the land.

Great altercation between different members of the council followed, finally quelled by the Chairman’s firm pronouncement: Of course, everybody knows that the Oreri people used to be on that land and that we drove them back in war, and therefore we hold the land by right of conquest (Unearthing, 94).

If the Oraeri were originally the owner of the bronze site, we cannot ask how it became Igbo Ukwu’s since the chairman has said they took it as war spoil. The question that should agitate minds is, “Who were the Igbo Ukwu?” an answer to this very question will settle, not only matters about their identity but also, issues connected to the truth about the name of their progenitor. And when these matters are solved, those who once questioned whether Nri is originally the owner of the civilization unearthed in Igbo Ukwu will have reasons to reconcile their thoughts with the truth placed before them.

I have shown the comment of W.F. Carpenter while discussing the Oraeri above. It is worthy of note that the center of the attraction that the Nri area had was simply that there was a spiritualist who healed people, propitiate their sins and reintegrated them back to their society. This multi-gifted effigy was the Eze Nri who dwelt in Nri. Because of him, people who were chased out of their community for one reason or the other assuredly found refuge in the kingdom. In Nri, they lived as free as other inhabitants. This was so because the Nri priest was in the mission of reconciling the world back to Chukwu. This was the same train that brought both Igbo Ukwu and Oraeri among others of their kinds to Nri. But, unlike the Oraeri, Igbo Ukwu situation appeared like they were sold out to Nri. This could be the reason why, even hitherto, Igbo Ukwu could not lay hand on a particular name as belonging to their progenitor.  What this means, invariably, is that Igbo Ukwu does not have a history of their own.

It is possible for any people to forget the name of their progenitor or the possible place he had migrated from. But, in most cases, where the history of any people is forgotten, there is usually certain pieces of the same history scattered into the history of the surrounding. In this condition, it may not be serial. In such a way, anybody trying to undertake a study of such a people’s tradition would have to undergo the task of gathering those pieces and sizing them up with the measures of time. We met such a situation with the history of Nri herself as shown above. The excerpt below explains the situation better.

where there is a related historical contiguity (such as one historical element giving birth to others around it) such contiguity can be vividly specified as proof of relationship but may not have indebt information bothering on the continual process that had sustained the contiguous offspring’s oral tradition.

With the help of Oka tradition, we were able to recover Nri history. Although, Oka oral tradition did not provide us with indebt information bothering on the continual process that had sustained Nri history in its generational series, it gave us the directions to uncover and recover Nri tradition. Igbo Ukwu did not have any of these. No community within and outside Nri kingdom could give any account of Igbo Ukwu, it doesn’t matter how succinct it may be. They claimed that they have lost the name of their ancestor, his migration route or the circumstance that led him to Nri. History sometimes presents some people very ugly. Yet at that, the inheritors of such ugly tradition do not always discard it completely. All that Igbo Ukwu could remember was a claim of one man called “Igbo.” He migrated from somewhere (not mention, no direction spelt out) with his brother, Amaekwulu, who subsequently founded another settlement which could not be remembered or located. The issue is, they do not want people to know that they were brought from unknown place to live in Nri either as recluse or as slaves. Nri had the tradition of assimilating slaves and allow them to live as normal people; we have mentioned this severally.

Another staring reason that appears to support the view that Igbo Ukwu ancestor might be a slave is their name. When Igbo Ukwu gained settlement at the part of Nri area which W.F. Carpenter described as “The grave yard of Nri kings”, they were called a different thing from the name they became known with after the finds was made in the area. They were called “Igbo Nkwor”. This was their original name. This name, according to the Igbo tradition, is relatively derogatory. When any people are denoted with such a reference, whet the speaker did not want to verbally express is that such a people are slaves. Igbo Nkwor is the best way Igbo euphemize slave. Another term used to euphemize such denotation is “Aka Ishi”. This is mostly used by the Nkanu people of Enugwu. When they refer any people as “Ndu eka ishi” (a people with six fingers), what they mean is that such a people are slaves. In Igbo Ukwu case, they were called “Ndi Igbo Nkwor”, meaning slaves or descendants of slaves. It was W.F. Carpenter who baptized them into Igbo Ukwu.

When Carpenter became involved in the unearthing of the archaeological finds in Igbo Ukwu, he was the District Commissioner of Oka division, residing in Oka. He was not comfortable with the term Igbo Ukwu were addressed with. Having spent time in Igbo land, particularly Oka who had shown strict concern about slaves, he got to have a clue of what the term, Igbo Nkwor, could connote. So, during his subsequent meeting with the inhabitants, Carpenter suggested to them that their name did not sound welcoming in the Igbo society base on his knowledge. He openly told them that the name connotes the idea of them being slaves. Then, he suggested that it would be preferable if they could change the second word, “Nkwor”, to “Ukwu”, since it imprints the meaning of greatness. Therefore, they can be referred to as Igbo Ukwu, meaning, the great Igbo. The inhabitants accepted this suggestion since it would scrape certain aspects of their inhuman threat. They accepted Carpenter’s view and wedded it into their name. from then hence, they began to refer to themselves as the Igbo Ukwu.

W.F. Carpenter got his idea from Oka communities. During his days in the area, he witnessed and learnt how Oka operate. Their meeting hours were being announced by Ikoro, just like every other Igbo communities. When the Ikoro of the Oka people (especially at Nkwo Imoka Square) sounded, it addressed Okain the following way,

            “Igbo ukwu, Igbo ukwu!

            Nnamenyi!

            Igbo ukwu, Igbo ukwu, Igbo ukwu! Nnamenyi!”

What the Ikolo said was:

Mighty town of the Igbo people! Mighty town of the Igbo people!!

            Your ancestors are great like the elephant!  

            Your ancestors are great like the elephant!!

“Igbo Ukwu”, as the Ikoro mentioned, is another term for the Oka word, “Igbulukwu,”. This used to be the appellation used by the Oka people in those days. It was the traditional praise-name of Oka, used in times of stress and acts of power. Whenever this was heard, all Oka quickly assembled to deal with whatever had arisen. Oka elders clearly told me that there is no historical evidence of this appellation in connection with other town of that name. meaning, it has no connection whatsoever with the name Igbo Ukwu as a settlement. Carpenter enquired of the meaning of the language of the Ikoro. He later used it to baptize Igbo Ukwu from their slavery connotation of “Ndi Igbo Nkwor”.